CEO Reed Hastings told investors he wasn't interested in "creative risks." But his company is betting a rumored $100 million for 26 episodes of a series no one has seen—based largely on "intuition" and the reputations of David Fincher and Kevin Spacey.

Netflix trumped Wall Street fears, with quarterly profit rising, and revenue increasing by 34% to $595.9 million. Most impressively, Netflix now boasts over 20 million subscribers—more than the total subscribers of premium channels Starz and Showtime.

It was only a matter of time. Dan Lyons, aka Fake Steve Jobs, is penning a comedy pilot about a tech mogul. Called iCON, the show has been commissioned by EPIX and will be directed by Larry Charles, the Seinfeld writer-producer who went on to direct Borat and Bruno.